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Chapters (54)
  1. Cover
  2. The Summer Queen
  3. Dedication Page
  4. Family Tree of King George III
  5. Family Tree of Queen Victoria
  6. PART ONE
  7. Chapter One
  8. Chapter Two
  9. Chapter Three
  10. Chapter Four
  11. Chapter Five
  12. Chapter Six
  13. Chapter Seven
  14. Chapter Eight
  15. Chapter Nine
  16. Chapter Ten
  17. Chapter Eleven
  18. Chapter Twelve
  19. Chapter Thirteen
  20. PART TWO
  21. Chapter Fourteen
  22. Chapter Fifteen
  23. Chapter Sixteen
  24. Chapter Seventeen
  25. Chapter Eighteen
  26. Chapter Nineteen
  27. Chapter Twenty
  28. Chapter Twenty-One
  29. Chapter Twenty-Two
  30. Chapter Twenty-Three
  31. Chapter Twenty-Four
  32. PART THREE
  33. Chapter Twenty-Five
  34. Chapter Twenty-Six
  35. Chapter Twenty-Seven
  36. Chapter Twenty-Eight
  37. Chapter Twenty-Nine
  38. Chapter Thirty
  39. Chapter Thirty-One
  40. Chapter Thirty-Two
  41. PART FOUR
  42. Chapter Thirty-Three
  43. Chapter Thirty-Four
  44. Chapter Thirty-Five
  45. Chapter Thirty-Six
  46. Chapter Thirty-Seven
  47. Chapter Thirty-Eight
  48. Chapter Thirty-Nine
  49. Chapter Forty
  50. Chapter Forty-One
  51. Acknowledgements
  52. Select Bibliography
  53. The Summer Queen
  54. By Margaret Pemberton

Early the next day, after his morning visit to Eddy, Manby said he suspected that Eddy had pneumonia. The Prince of Wales summoned his own physician, Dr Laking, so that Laking could assist Manby. Then he telegraphed for Dr Broadbent, who had so recently and successfully treated Georgie for typhoid.

In the afternoon May sat by the side of Eddy’s bed and read to him. Propped up on pillows, he managed to talk to her about their wedding and how fortunate it was that he’d fallen ill now, and not nearer their wedding date, when the wedding might well have had to be postponed.

With Laking and Broadbent’s arrival, pneumonia was diagnosed and the following morning, when May went with Georgie to visit Eddy, it was to find that a screen had been erected around his bed and they could only see him by standing on their tiptoes and looking over the top of it.

For the first time it occurred to her that Eddy was not just out of sorts, but ill. The same thing had occurred to the rest of the birthday party and, wanting to give the family privacy at such a time, house guests began leaving discreetly, all saying that it wouldn’t be long before they would be meeting up again at the wedding.

Having fought off her cold, his mother was now also visiting Eddy for long periods throughout the day, and the room next to the bedroom, which had previously been used as a study, was now turned into a sitting room, so that his close family had no need to keep navigating the narrow corridors that led to his room from the main part of the house.

The doctors reported on Eddy’s condition regularly to the Prince of Wales, and when May asked her future father-in-law why, with the guests gone, Eddy couldn’t be returned to his own comfortable bedroom, he said, ‘The doctors don’t recommend such a move, May. Not yet, although maybe they will do so in a few days’ time when Eddy has turned a corner and is on the mend.’

May was now spending nearly all her time with Georgie, peeping over the barrier of the screen as Broadbent, Laking and Manby hurried in and out of the room; or taking short walks with him in the grounds to get a breath of fresh air.